CULTURAL WORKINGS

Welcome to THE CULTURAL WORKER, a blog dedicated to arts of the people ranging from the radical avant garde and free jazz to dissident folk forms and popular arts . The Cultural Worker celebrates revolutionary creativity and features a variety of essays, reviews, fiction, reportage, poetry and musings through the internet pen of this writer, musician and cultural organizer. Scroll straight down and you'll also find an extensive historical Photo Exhibit of cultural workers in action, followed by a series of Radical Arts Links. The features herein will be unabashedly partisan---make no mistake about that. The concept of the cultural worker as a force of fearless creativity, of social change, indeed as an artistic arm of radicalism, has always been left-wing when applied with any degree of honesty at all. No revolutionary act can be truly complete in the absence of art, no progressive campaign can retain its message sans the daring drumbeat of invention, no act of dissent can stand so strong as that which counts the writers, musicians, painters, dancers, actors, photographers, film and performance artists within its ranks. Here's to the history and legacy of cultural work in the throes of the good fight...john pietaro

Friday, December 30, 2011

For as long
as there has been dissent, there has been the protest song. In the people’s
history, the fight for social justice has always been accompanied by, inspired
by the voices of outspoken songwriters, the daring harmonies of dissident
composers, the passionate cry of radical poets and the compelling news reports
of the topical balladeer. This is the drumbeat of radicalism. Phil Ochs told us
that every headline can be realized as verse just as he cautioned us that, “a
protest song is something you don’t hear on the radio”. But regardless of
popular acceptance or not, the music of revolution prevails.

One can
easily trace work songs back to the earliest toilers and songs of revolt
directly to the movements to organize—in each era. Reviewing poetry or ballads
composed on slave ships, within workers’ hovels or concentration camps, or in
cold urban landscapes, we can not only gain valuable information about earlier
uprisings against injustice, but develop a visceral understanding of them.
Where progressive history books offer core stories and important dates, topical
art-forms deliver the fervor, the agitation, the struggle of the embattled to
survive and then to live. Bread and
roses.

Often
artists can become overwhelmed by the stressors in their midst. In the US, the
creative community has never had adequate funding or respect, so in times of
fiscal constraint, we can easily fall victim. Further, audiences during lean years
find it easier to simply avoid. Popular culture reflects this in “the feel-good
movie of the year” or the litany of Top 40 hits that are pure escapism.

After eight
years of Bush and Cheney, with the rise of cowboy capitalism, first-strike
offenses and a repressive economy, progressives of every shade began to build a
protest movement of ebbs and flows. Many sought out change through the Obama
candidacy. With the promise of the nation’s first African American president,
one who’d had a background as a community organizer, countless among us were
moved to rebuild a progressive base. But Obama’s drive toward conciliation with
the forces of reaction for far too long turned many off. The teabaggers were
all over the news and every brand of lunatic flooded the right-wing. Oh, there
were pockets of celebrated rebellion: Wisconsin taught us all. But on the heels
of that amazing takeover, Occupy Wall Street happened. And then nothing was the
same.

In my own
experience as a musician and a cultural organizer (one moved toward Left
philosophy as a direct result of the first Reagan term!), I’d long sought out
something—anything—like OWS. And here came a disparate group with no visible
leader, one that united all facets of the Left, liberalism, and Labor, and not
just the most progressive of unions. Yeah, it turned out to be this generation’s
Popular Front. After my first visit to Zuccotti Park, I was drawn to return many
times, usually carrying a drum. The first time I sat in with the pulsating mass
of a drum circle, I realized the distance our message could carry. How voluminous
the voice of a determined, unified group! We breathed as one through percussion
and this was evidenced by the reactions of the beaming, dancing passerby, often
wearing designer suits and Italian shoes but sharing in a historic moment with
this band of rad rhythmatists.

Though drum
circles are empowering and an excellent means to build still larger masses,
there is a need for musicians of conscience to forge a more cohesive
unit, a cultural arm of OWS. Rather than the occasional folksinger or rapper
writing an anthem for the movement, why couldn’t there be, shouldn’t there be a
solid, committed organization which would feed the protest, inspire creativity
and then take it out to the wider populace? The Occupy Musicians group (www.occupymusicians.com)
is an exciting means toward this goal. Hundreds of signatories and a series of
events has fortified the organization’s dawning. Now what’s left to do is to
draw on the considerable strengths of musicians of conscience; we must agitate,
educate and organize through song, through verse, through shout and stomp, through
musical weaponry.

Using earlier
cultural movements as models, we can draw on the work of the bards, the songsters,
poets, playwrights and journalists of the Industrial Workers of the World. This
radical internationalist union counted artists in their front line of
organizers. This spawned the likes of Joe Hill; no mean feat! And the Socialist
Party in the first decades of the 20th century also laid the ground
work for later models. It did so with the likes of Jack London and Carl
Sandburg and by the 1930s founded the Radical Arts Group toward the establishment
of a national cultural program. However it was the Communist Party which, in
the 1930s and ‘40s, successfully founded a cultural commission of widespread
proportions. It not only counted artists such as Paul Robeson, Woody Guthrie, Dalton
Trumbo, Hazel Scott and the Almanac Singers in its ranks, but a massive list of
fellow travelers across the country. Of important note are the arts collectives
under CP cultural auspices which were both activist bases and educational
seminars for all genres: the John Reed Club, the League of American Writers,
the American Artists’ Congress, the Red Dancers, and the Composers Collective
of New York which produced contemporary classical works that were at least as
daring musically as they were politically!

The
generation of folksingers in the 1960s became the very soul of the struggles of
civil rights and peace. Immortal, moving works were created and tirelessly sang
at each rally and march. Folk revival musicians such as Bob Dylan, Odetta, Phil
Ochs and Joan Baez wrote the anthems that acted as shields against the assaults
of the police and the national guard, as did the songs which had originated in
southern Black churches. Performers like the Freedom Singers made all the
difference in the world when staring down Bull Connor. And the Black Arts
Movement offered creative guidance along with fiery radical sounds to urban
centers. Avant garde jazz figured highly into this scene, as well it should in
today’s movement. Legendary names like Amiri Baraka, the late Sam Rivers, the
AACM and Black Arts Group were instrumental, so to speak, in countless
seminars, rallies, gatherings and confrontations. There’s was a music which
celebrated African culture as it fought for American rights through the most
creative means.

The Punk
movement often carried with it an anarchist message, or in the least an
intolerance for mere compliance. While some aspects of Punk could seem
right-wing due to the presence of fascist imagery (to shock) most Punks were
drawn to the Left messages found in the music of the Clash and the fight
against Reaganism launched by the Dead Kennedys. Punk also turned “DIY” into a freedom
cry for all artists. Hip Hop has also stood out as a people’s movement which
has called on multiple generations to speak out. For every gangsta rapper there
are scores of Hip Hop artists who use their poetry and music as a means of
unity and expression: life and survival in the ghettos, exposing social ills
and the need for social change are mainstays. Some rappers are inspired by the
Beat poets of the ‘50s, and most are well aware of the radical statements of
Gil-Scott Heron. Rappers like Dead Prez and Immortal Technique have focused on
a specific kind of topical Hip Hop.

MUSICIANS
ALIGNED WITH THE OWS MOVEMENT need to make a close study of the history of cultural
workers in building a lasting organization. Occupy Musicians should call on
composers, improvisers, rappers, singers, songwriters and instrumentalists;
there’s a need for pop singers, jazz and contemporary classical musicians, hip
hop artists, world music performers, folkies, satirists, rockers, balladeers
and punks. We must speak in every language, to every taste, to allow for the
unrestrained flow of outreach. And we need to establish a series of awareness-raising
concerts, to circulate recordings of OWS musicians and offer teach-ins and
workshops to not only insure continuity of current artists but to inspire the
generations to come. Occupy Musicians can not only offer a soundtrack to OWS
but can drive it with Shock Brigade bands to descend upon rallies and marches. And
to really be thorough, we need to do so in concert with radical poets,
performance artists and other cultural workers.

Occupy
Musicians can become an integral part of Occupy movements all over the nation,
all over the world. And through both concert presentations and social media we
can grow a network that will keep live music relevant even as it carries
activists to the necessary next level, true social and political change. Upward,
onward.

-John Pietaro is a musician, writer (http://TheCulturalWorker.blogspot.com)
and activist from Brooklyn NY. He is the leader of Radio NOIR (www.reverbnation.com/radionoir)
and the director of the annual Dissident Arts Festival.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Here's
a concert recording of a rather expanded Radio NOIR line-up performing
at the C.O.M.A. experimental music series at ABC No Rio, the celebrated anarchist space in NYC, 12/18/11. John Pietaro (xylophone, frame
drums, percussion, spoken word), Javier Hernandez-Miyares (elec guitar),
Laurie Towers (electric bass) with guests Frederika Krier (violin) and
Rocco John Iacovone (soprano and alto saxophones). Our regular fourth member, clarinetist Quincy Saul, was unavailable for the gig as he was in Durban South Africa reporting on the Climate Conference (a pretty good excuse if I may say!) so we adapted some of our regular material to this line-up and of course added in some new things too. We'd also planned on performing a newly realized version of the brilliant Phil Ochs song, "No Christmas in Kentucky" but unfortunately there was not enough time. Still, this was a notable evening of music-on-the-edge.

Much thanks to the very talented Frederika and Rocco for being a part of this day. For more info on ABC No Rio and the COMA experimental music series curated by Blaise Siwula see www.abcnorio.org

Friday, December 9, 2011

Radio NOIR, the 'dissident swing' combo, will be performing a set of their unique improvisational protest music at noted anarchist performance space ABC No Rio, on Sunday Dec 18, 2011---one of the final concerts in the COMA experimental music series before the space closes its doors for a lengthy remodeling. Works will include reconstructions of Hanns Eisler and Woody Guthrie pieces, plus free improvisation, twisted standards and modernist blues. John Pietaro (xylophone, percussion, voice), Javier Hernandez-Miyares (electric guitar, effects), Laurie Towers (electric bass) and as our clarinetist Quincy Saul is proudly away on important activist business in Durban South Africa, we will be joined by guest saxophonist Rocco John Iacovone among other special guests.

The Stone stands quietly and without fanfare at the corner
of Avenue C and East 2nd Street. The club is set in an old store front that
still bears the markings of pre-gentrified Alphabet City. So unassuming is it
that there’s no sign over its door proclaiming that a new experimental music
space—one which features the free exchange of art and ideas--has taken back
part of New York otherwise lost to the developers and yuppies. The Lower East
Side , New York’s historic center of alternative arts and struggle, survived
years of neglect and decay during which it was shunned by a larger society attempting
to cut off its immigrant and poor population just until the ‘hood became
fashionable. And as its boarded-up shops transformed into bistros, it ‘became’
the East Village and was sold to the highest bidder. And somehow post-modern
saxophonist John Zorn made a grab to claim some of this prized territory for
the movement. This community --where Beat poetry found its home, where the most
radical of Left activists congregated, where jazz’s loft scene was birthed,
where the punk movement began and where the post-punk avant garde coalesced into
No Wave—has taken back one of its lost corners. There’s cause to celebrate but
the Stone remains the Village’s best-kept secret. And the noise about it only
seems to occur within.

Having enjoyed memorable performances in LES clubs and
galleries back when there was a healthy scene harboring this kind of music, I
well remember the once-affordable community and its phalanx of artists, anarchists,
addicts, dealers, homeless, Hell’s Angels and poverty-stricken residents. No,
they weren’t really good old times because there was too much hurt and yet the
area held a strange beauty that’s long gone. Walking through the door of the
Stone brings me back almost immediately. The space is tight, intimate. The
lights are dim. The energy is whirling, barely contained in the walls about me.
I felt it on my first visit: Musicians flow in, greeting each other with warm,
jovial exchanges, laughs, and discussions about a recent tour with this or that
one, the last gig with so-and-so, or baseball scores and small talk. Dressed
down, unpacking their axes these men and women are as unassuming as the club
itself. I walk over the uneven floorboards and find a spot near the back, next
to the drummer and two upright bassists preparing for the evening’s excursion. I
stand amidst a mini xylophone or glockenspiel, large and small frame drums,
several small hand-held percussives, sometimes a dumbek, and a pair of crowded
racks sporting woodblocks, temple blocks, cowbells and a triangle. Somehow I set
it up in a manner that’s workable but not imposing to the tightly-packed band,
which ranges from a minimum of 12 members to a more standard number of about 23.
The immediacy of those around me seems to extend well beyond the physical.

Karl Berger and Ingrid Sertso enter the room, gently
reaching out to the musicians sitting in a two-rowed semi-circle. The band
responds in kind, offering greetings, brief bits of humorous tales and other
chitchat. But this is not a mere social call. Soon Karl seats himself
caddy-corner at the piano and offers some basic ideas as to what the music will
be like tonight. In some cases choosing pieces he’s worked on with the
Orchestra before, in others, introducing brand new ones without warning, of
course.

The compositions are often his own but just as likely penned by the
Ornette Coleman or Don Cherry, or other past collaborators. Many are drawn from
the repertoire of world folk songs (Karl is especially fond of Turkish music). But
it can never be said that there is anything assumed or pre-planned about this
band’s music. There is NEVER a written score and when the band needs to learn a
jazz head or other melody, it is simply played at the piano, at times slowly
and repetitively, until the musicians are comfortable with what’s to come. Karl
offers some info on the particular mode or the tradition in which the piece was
developed as his hands lightly run over piano keys. The musicians are all
veterans and adept at this kind of performance, but Karl’s advice and
philosophical guidance are never taken begrudgingly. “Please let’s remember to
pay close attention to dynamics in this passage,” Karl is wont to explain as he
demonstrates the importance of the phrasing in a piece. Standing now, he raises
a hand and gently fans it downward: “You can almost leave that last note out
completely. In fact, I would like some of you to fade the phrase just before it
ends to really exaggerate the emotion. Deeee-da.
Deeee-da”. And the music, already
inspired and executed beautifully, comes fully alive. By design, this band is
geared toward the highest level of creativity, and the tools of such
creativity--free improvisation, on-the-spot composition, modernist harmonies,
world rhythms, technical expertise, and latter-day angst—are in constant demand
here.

The Stone Workshop Orchestra’s sound is born of the moment,
founded by the players’ instincts, skill and need to emote----and it’s then
organized by Karl’s artful hand and facial expressions. Sculptor-like, he molds
and shapes the aural force emanating from this collection of brass, reeds,
strings and percussion set before him. Refusing to consider his part in this as
conduction (“really, this is not so
specific, I just cue and offer guidance, you do the rest…”), Berger none the
less has developed an incredible language of his own; never losing sight of the
musicians’ individuality, he plays the orchestra. Karl’s unique hand
signals--and welcoming eye contact---bring in sections, soloists or the tutti
ensemble, and in doing so, establishes range, tempo, volume, timbre and vibe.

Through
his cues the band knows the direction and shape as well as the duration of the
notes to be played---but the specific notes remain our own. He guides
orchestral accents behind the force of a soloist’s excursion, adding to the
soundscape and fierce intensity. Karl then layers one solo over another and
calls on this or that accompaniment—which ultimately is seen as just an
important a voice in the mix and may very well take over the spotlight. Feel is paramount and interpretation is
demanded. Its clearly there in the leader’s eyes each time he becomes engulfed
in the tapestry. Leaning back into the sound in a moment of particularly rich
improvised harmony, Karl adds: “It took Gil Evans two years to write a chord
like that!”

The final performance of the Stone
Workshop Orchestra—at least in this incarnation—occurred on December
5, during which time the Stone’s inner walls shook under the weight of the
music. Two full concert sets (no workshop for this gig) left the room dank with
perspiration and brimming with intensity. Guest soloists, to really drive the
point home, were legendary avant alto player John Zorn and the brilliant
trumpet and slide-trumpet player Steven Bernstein, and the band exploded under
and about these two voices of unbridled improvisation. Zorn seeking no
attention, remained reserved before putting horn to mouth, but wailed and shook
over his instrument like a feverish, davoning rabbi when he played. The
ensemble shouted accents as Zorn sonically fought back the depth hovering just
above, drawing from and warding off the wall of music he encountered. From my
spot near the back, with a line of winds and strings immediately in front, dual
basses to my right and drums just behind, the room seemed to ascend with Karl’s
conducting wizardy guiding the journey. And just then Steven Bernstein hollered across
the thicket with a slide trumpet improvisation that should have lifted off the
roof, polyrhythmic pulsations falling over the brass call to arms. New visions of
a developed repertoire spoke volumes about the potential for this band. No one
could accept that it would simply end; the rush to find a new site is on with
plans being carefully laid for a new residency and a series of other
performances to continue the mission.

As winter’s chill arrives on the Lower East
Side, the echo of musical liberation descends over the luxury condos and gourmet
delis, declaring the legacy of fearless creativity. And in its resonance, the
music tears away the cloud of conformity and clears the path for further
generations of New Music.

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Radio NOIR'S improvisatory, ethereal adaptation of this beautiful Woody Guthrie theme is presented today in strong reflection of Thanksgiving in hard times. Guthrie's ballad of migrant farm workers struggling for dignity is timeless.

Radio NOIR chose to approach this piece in a unique manner which is built upon the Minimalist-influenced xylophone line of John Pietaro and the insistent, grinding bass of Laurie Towers. Javier Hernandez-Miyares' effects-laden guitar builds an incredible atmosphere in which the ensemble lays out a pasture of conflict and struggle for the melodic realization by Quincy Saul's clarinet. After the actual Guthrie melody is heard in full, the quartet stretches out with solo statements built into a sort of collective improv. In the melody's final hearing Hernandez-Miyares' guitar effects build to create a soundscape indicative of a southern textile factory's looms, tying the concept of the field worker into industry, open spaces into a darker, untouchable sky.

"Pastures of Plenty" was produced by Javier Hernandez-Miyares and recorded by Natalie Scarborough at 17 Frost Theatre of the Arts, Brooklyn NY, October 2011 www.17frost.com

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

I can still recall when I first became aware of the
wonderful subtleties of Paul Motian. I was a college freshman and in checking
out his latest quartet album I had to stop to listen a second time to get it. As drummers go, he stood apart
from most by simply allowing his instrument to breathe. While Motian lacked
nothing in technical skill, his approach to the instrument was considerably
more Zen than chops: you just knew that this guy had read Cage’s writings on
silence. At 18, a budding jazz percussionist who practiced constantly in order
to build up speed and endurance, hearing Paul Motian dance over his cymbals as
Bill Frisell’s guitar moaned gently, I came to know the importance of
reflective playing and the power of space. Motian had made it into an art form.

Paul Motian first came to prominence in the music world
through his part in the classic Bill Evans Trio. In this aggregation, neither
he nor the groundbreaking bassist Scott LaFaro, who died tragically young after
pioneering a melodic bass style, were viewed as “accompanists” by Evans; not by
a long shot. The trio were equal partners in the unique brand of jazz they
produced---some called it cerebral but that’s way too simple to describe the
likes of “Waltz for Debbie”, “Autumn Leaves” or “My Foolish Heart”. Hear these
tracks as chamber music if you’d like but the swing is always there and damned
clear. The music got inside of itself and the drumming grooved it along through
and well beyond introspection. Motian’s use of wire brushes whispered but also snapped,
rolled, danced. Shuussshing his way over the most tender of ballads, as Evans’
widely spaced intervals resounded above and below, Motian sang with his sizzle
cymbal and fluttering hi-hats. And in this late ‘50s-early ‘60s period when
drummers just kept cranking their kits to tighter, higher pitches, Motian went
low, offering carefully resounding tom-toms and a throbbing bass drum that
served as a deep heartbeat one moment, a ringing timpani the next. And his
interplay with LaFaro, he of the whirling melodic flight in place of a standard
‘walk’, was an avant garde of its own. Here was a rhythm section that held
equal reign over the trio’s direction and if the bass was welcome to offer
counter-point and counter-melody well then so was the drums. Evans’ band
functioned, it’s often been said, as three components of one indefatigable
musician.

Such musical passion, however, was not to be contained in
one ensemble and Motian, into the 1960s, began working with a variety of other
contemporary jazz artists, particularly “cool school” stalwarts like Lee
Konitz. This led him to another lengthy and notable gig with a pianist of
powerfully creative muse, Paul Bley, who fused composition and free
improvisation in new and daring ways. The Bley ensemble reached well into Free
Jazz and Motian, though retaining respect for space and atmosphere, offered a
more animated counterpoint in his playing than he had with Evans. Suddenly the
family name seemed to indicate real ‘motion’ as bar-lines disappeared beneath
the drummer’s blurring, timeless pulsations and jazz became new all over again.

Motian’s journey, by the close of the ‘60s, helped to bring music
in line with radical politics through the Liberation Music Orchestra led by
Charlie Haden and Carla Bley. This large ensemble, in beautifully outspoken
terms, shaped protest of the Vietnam War and the Nixon Administration into a
historic album’s worth of material. Juxtaposing modernist harmonies and free improv
into songs of the Spanish Civil War successfully embedded the Old Left into the
New and to hell with generational gaps. Traditional melodies associated with
that first fight against the fascists paired with compositions by Hanns Eisler/Bertolt
Brecht as well as Carla Bley brought the day’s injustices into alarming light. Motian
can be effectively heard sporting martial drumming, spiraling through totally abstract
rhythms and incorporating series of bells and chimes into his kit. His ride
cymbal was relentless, symbolic of the struggle and driving home the solos of
Don Cherry, Dewey Redman, Mike Matler, Rosewell Rudd and Gato Barbieri, among others.

In the 1970s Motian began a long tenure in Keith Jarrett’s
band where he seems to have perfected his free improv concepts. More so, the
Jarrett work was an extension on what he’d achieved with the trios of Evans and
Bley; perhaps the realization of the piano trio by this time saw the format
taken to its absolute limits, flipped onto its head, and in turn Jarrett happily
accompanied the drummer on his own debut record date as a leader in 1972. While
still engaged in the Jarrett band, Motian began to explore his own concepts
throughout the decade and by the 1980s came to be known as the leader of one of
the hippest ensembles in jazz. His own quartets and trios were fluid, with time
being an implied concept and musicians’ roles in the ensemble always subject to
the artistry of the moment. The band which featured Bill Frisell’s guitar and
Joe Lovano’s tenor saxophone allowed for an atmospheric kind of jazz rarely
heard anywhere since the high times of the Bill Evans Trio. Frisell’s use of
the volume pedal turned his guitar in many ways, into another horn or a
seemingly bowed string instrument, but with a hip, eerie kind of electric echo.
The lack of a bassist meant that each of the trio needed to take on the
role---or no one at all---and the entire order of what a jazz combo should be
was arbitrary.

Paul Motian’s ensembles in the last decades were always
fresh and exciting: at times in all-electric groupings, at other points
performing his own take on standards in a more common jazz setting (the ‘Broadway’
album is a must listen-to) or simply playing free. His illness, myelodysplastic--a
blood and bone marrow disorder—saw his touring come to an end in recent years
but his band became a fixture at the Village Vanguard, offering visual and
aural lessons in compositional drumming to all who flocked to the legendary New
York club. Motian died at age 80 early this morning, November 21, 2011. His
contribution to music’s progress immortalized. Regardless of the notes he may
have played in the course of any given selection, solo, chorus, indeed measure,
Motian made the very silences between them swing, bringing the listener to the
next sound with anticipation. And that is pretty much all a musician can hope
for.

-John Pietaro is a musician and writer from New York City. He leads the
ensemble Radio NOIR www.reverbnation.com/radionoir.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Radio NOIR:"The Lost Broadcast" E.P.

Radio
NOIR is a quartet which wields its own unique brand of dissident swing.
Helmed by xylophonist/percussionist John Pietaro and featuring the
clarinet of Quincy Saul, the electric guitar of Javier Hernandez-Miyares
and the electric bass of Laurie Towers, the band made its debut at the
2011 Dissident Arts Festival (August 13, 2011, the Brecht Forum, NYC).
Soon after the members recognized that the artistic as well as
socio-political ties that led to the founding of Radio NOIR was indeed a
reason to hold the band together. Inspired by the fervent radicalism
and sounds of the 1930s as well as the daring post-punk improvisations
of downtown NYC, Radio NOIR seeks to build bridges between Left politics
and Jazz, radical philosophy and New Music. "The Lost Broadcast", Radio NOIR's 4-song E.P. collection, was recorded live in an all-day marathon session at 17 Frost Theatre of the Arts (Williamsburg, Brooklyn NY) in October 2011. The final document not only includes blazing audio tracks of the band's unique 'dissident swing' but wholly produced videos as well, inclusive of imagery projected onto 17 Frost's three massive screen's positioned around Radio NOIR during the recording process. Note that some of the imagery is comprised of excerpts of the seminal sci-fi/social change film 'Metropolis' by director Fritz Lang. It is not happenstance that Lang's film was directly influenced by his visions of NYC during his initial visit here--- likewise now his work inspires Radio NOIR in their music-activism journey. This E.P. is Radio NOIR's
debut recording and one which offers a vivid account of their
convictions. Starting from the bitter social unrest of the 1930s, the
quartet produce a music which speaks loudly to today's struggles for
social and economic justice. Wrapped in the shadows of Depression-era
New York, the four titles bridge Hot Jazz to noir novels, ethereal
sounds to No Wave, the words of revolutionary composer Hanns Eisler to
free improvisation and the music of Woody Guthrie to a restless,
relentless kind of swing. The members of Radio NOIR are
experienced improvisors, with New Music as well as expansive Jazz and
Pop burnt deeply into their repertoires, but always they maintain the
still higher goal of the arts as cultural work, a means toward real
social change.

Here is the first release from The Lost Broadcast....

"Langston" (John Pietaro/Quincy Saul)
- a 'modernist blues' dedicated to Langston Hughes and his
revolutionary intellectual cohorts in the Harlem Renaissance. In this
chamber Jazz piece which opens in a rather mellow mood, the quartet
blows over changes in a C-minor blues form which is extended by a
whole-tone section. Quincy Saul's clarinet and John Pietaro's xylophone
establish the contrapuntal melodic lines, ultimately racing about each
other, as Javier Hernandez-Miyares' electric guitar barks commentary
from the sideline and Laurie Towers' bold, unshakeable electric bass
holds the entire group together in a manner which actually negates the
need for a drummer.

For more info on Radio NOIR please take a moment to stop by our Facebook page as well as our Reverbnation page......

Friday, November 11, 2011

The Stone stands quietly and without fanfare at the corner of Avenue C and East 2nd Street. The club is set in an old store front that still bears the markings of pre-gentrified Alphabet City. So unassuming is it that there’s no sign over its door proclaiming that a new experimental music space—one which features the free exchange of art and ideas--has taken back part of New York otherwise lost to the developers and yuppies. The Lower East Side , New York’s historic center of alternative arts and struggle, survived years of neglect and decay during which it was shunned by a larger society attempting to cut off its immigrant and poor population just until the ‘hood became fashionable. And as its boarded-up shops transformed into bistros, it ‘became’ the East Village and was sold to the highest bidder. And somehow post-modern saxophonist John Zorn made a grab to claim some of this prized territory for the movement. This community --where Beat poetry found its home, where the most radical of Left activists congregated, where jazz’s loft scene was birthed, where the punk movement began and where the post-punk avant garde coalesced into No Wave—has taken back one of its lost corners. There’s cause to celebrate but the Stone remains the Village’s best-kept secret. And the noise about it only seems to occur within.

Having enjoyed memorable performances in LES clubs and galleries back when there was a healthy scene harboring this kind of music, I well remember the once-affordable community and its phalanx of artists, anarchists, addicts, dealers, homeless, Hell’s Angels and poverty-stricken residents. No, they weren’t really good old times because there was too much hurt and yet the area held a strange beauty that’s long gone. Walking through the door of the Stone brings me back almost immediately. The space is tight, intimate. The lights are dim. The energy is whirling, barely contained in the walls about me. I felt it on my first visit: Musicians flow in, greeting each other with warm, jovial exchanges, laughs, and discussions about a recent tour with this or that one, the last gig with so-and-so, or baseball scores and small talk. Dressed down, unpacking their axes these men and women are as unassuming as the club itself. I walk over the uneven floorboards and find a spot near the back, next to the drummer and two upright bassists preparing for the evening’s excursion. I stand amidst a mini xylophone or glockenspiel, large and small frame drums, several small hand-held percussives, sometimes a dumbek, and a pair of crowded racks sporting woodblocks, temple blocks, cowbells and a triangle. Somehow I set it up in a manner that’s workable but not imposing to the tightly-packed band, which ranges from a minimum of 12 members to a more standard number of about 23. The immediacy of those around me seems to extend well beyond the physical.

Karl Berger and Ingrid Sertso enter the room, gently reaching out to the musicians sitting in a two-rowed semi-circle. The band responds in kind, offering greetings, brief bits of humorous tales and other chitchat. But this is not a mere social call. Soon Karl seats himself caddy-corner at the piano and offers some basic ideas as to what the music will be like tonight. In some cases choosing pieces he’s worked on with the Orchestra before, in others, introducing brand new ones without warning, of course. The compositions are often his own but just as likely penned by the Ornette Coleman or Don Cherry, or other past collaborators. Many are drawn from the repertoire of world folk songs (Karl is especially fond of Turkish music). But it can never be said that there is anything assumed or pre-planned about this band’s music. There is NEVER a written score and when the band needs to learn a jazz head or other melody, it is simply played at the piano, at times slowly and repetitively, until the musicians are comfortable with what’s to come. Karl offers some info on the particular mode or the tradition in which the piece was developed as his hands lightly run over piano keys. The musicians are all veterans and adept at this kind of performance, but Karl’s advice and philosophical guidance are never taken begrudgingly. “Please let’s remember to pay close attention to dynamics in this passage,” Karl is wont to explain as he demonstrates the importance of the phrasing in a piece. Standing now, he raises a hand and gently fans it downward: “You can almost leave that last note out completely. In fact, I would like some of you to fade the phrase just before it ends to really exaggerate the emotion. Deeee-da. Deeee-da”. And the music, already inspired and executed beautifully, comes fully alive. By design, this band is geared toward the highest level of creativity, and the tools of such creativity--free improvisation, on-the-spot composition, modernist harmonies, world rhythms, technical expertise, and latter-day angst—are in constant demand here.

The Stone Workshop Orchestra’s sound is born of the moment, founded by the players’ instincts, skill and need to emote----and it’s then organized by Karl’s artful hand and facial expressions. Sculptor-like, he molds and shapes the aural force emanating from this collection of brass, reeds, strings and percussion set before him. Refusing to consider his part in this as conduction (“really, this is not so specific, I just cue and offer guidance, you do the rest…”), Berger none the less has developed an incredible language of his own; never losing sight of the musicians’ individuality, he plays the orchestra. Karl’s unique hand signals--and welcoming eye contact---bring in sections, soloists or the tutti ensemble, and in doing so, establishes range, tempo, volume, timbre and vibe. Through his cues the band knows the direction and shape as well as the duration of the notes to be played---but the specific notes remain our own. He guides orchestral accents behind the force of a soloist’s excursion, adding to the soundscape and fierce intensity. Karl then layers one solo over another and calls on this or that accompaniment—which ultimately is seen as just an important a voice in the mix and may very well take over the spotlight. Feel is paramount and interpretation is demanded.

The performances of the Stone Workshop Orchestra now dwindle down and I contemplate this journey, one not only through avant music but the revolutionary art that begat the need for such an ensemble in this place and time. Karl has no intention of letting this band cease, though the end of season at the Stone will arrive on December 5—in the form of a blow-out pair of concerts which will include special guests including John Zorn. As winter’s chill arrives on the Lower East Side, the Orchestra’s shouts of musical liberation descend over the luxury condos and gourmet delis, declaring the legacy of fearless creativity. And in its resonance, the music tears away the cloud of conformity and clears the path for further generations of New Music.

About Me

John Pietaro, writer/musician/cultural organizer; Staff Writer, The NYC Jazz Record. Contributing Writer: Z Magazine, the Nation, CounterPunch, the Wire, many others. His latest book, ON THE CREATIVE FRONT: ESSAYS ON THE CULTURE OF LIBERATION, is under review for publication. Pietaro also wrote a chapter for the Harvey Pekar/Paul Buhle book SDS: A GRAPHIC HISTORY (2007 Hill &Wang). In 2013 he self-published a volume of contemporary proletarian fiction, NIGHT PEOPLE. Current projects: co-writing/editing the autobiography of Amina Baraka; authoring a novel. Founded NEW MASSES MEDIA in 2013, production/ publicity company. As a musician Pietaro performs on the NYC free jazz/new music circuit on hand drums, drumkit, vibraphone, percussion, voice. Over the years he has created music with Amina Baraka, Alan Ginsberg, Pete Seeger, Karl Berger, Fred Ho, Ras Moshe, many more. Leader: the Red Microphone. Founder/producer, annual Dissident Arts Festival. Pietaro has spoken on arts activism at Left Forum, the Vision Festival and other venues. He is a member of the Author's Guild, PEN America, National Writers Union UAW 1981 and Jazz Journalists Association

NIGHT PEOPLE and Other Tales of Working NY

'THE RED MICROPHONE SPEAKS!' CD, 2013

"Revenge of the Atom Spies" (2007)

The Flames of Discontent: Laurie Towers & John Pietaro ..................SCROLL DOWN FOR an extensive 'PHOTO EXHIBIT' of cultural workers in history and a thorough list of 'RADICAL LINKS' !

'Little Red Song Book'

still fanning the flames

John Reed and Boardman Robinson, 1913

The revolutionary writer and political cartoonist in Europe

Edward Hopper

"Night on the El Train", 1918

Anti-War Dance

Anti-War Dance - WW1

Louis Fraina

Writer and early Communist movement leader was later purged from the CP in a haze of controversy. Currently all traces of him remain disappeared from official Party documents

William Gropper: "Revolutionary Age", July 1919

Organ of the Left-Wing of the SPUSA (roots of the CPUSA), edited by Louis Fraina

The Funeral of JOHN REED

1920--at the Kremlin Wall

'Metropolis'

Fritz Lang's powerful depiction of a futuristic society ruled by a lazy bourgeois totally dependent on the laboring of the workers in the depths of the city

'New Masses', 1928

Amazingly hip artwork by Louis Lozowick

Brecht in Leathers

Somehow encompasses all that was 30s Berlin and 70s New York all at the same time

The chilling art of Fred Ellis

from "The Daily Worker", 1931

Debs, with Max Eastman and Rose Pastor Stokes

The patron saint of the Socialist Party working closely with Communist Party cultural leaders--the arts can climb above the fray

'The Red Songbook'

compiled by members of the Composers Collective of NY, a CPUSA cultural organization

Langston Hughes

Eisler and Brecht

Composer Hanns Eisler and poet Bertolt Brecht, revolutionary artists

'Song of the United Front''

music by Hanns Eisler, lyric by Bertolt Brecht

Sid Hoff, 'The Daily Worker', 1930s

"Thank God he doesn't have to swim with the dirty masses in Coney Island"

Paul Robeson

performing for British strikers, 1930s

Stuart Davis

at work

'The Anvil'

Organ of the John Reed Club, 1934

The Rebel Song Book, 1935

Socialist Party cultural publication compiled by SP poet and journalist Samuel H. Friedman. In these fervant years Friedman almost singlehandedly led the Socialist arts program which included much live perforamnce, literature, lectures, gallery exhibits and even the radio station WEVD, named for Debs, which broadcast radio dramas, music and speeches.

The League of American Writers

1936 statement on the urgency of the Spanish Civil War by this powerfully united group of Left and liberal writers, coalesced through a CP initiaitive. The League was an an outgrowth of the American Writers Congress. As strong as this grouping was, its creation also sounded the death toll for the more radical John Reed Club, which was dissolved by Party leaders this same year.

'Waiting for Lefty', 1935

The Group Theatre's debut production of Odets immortal agit-prop play. Yes, that's a young Elia Kazan out in front shouting 'Strike! Strike!" decades before the crisis of conscience and career which saw him naming names in his second HUAC hearing. But wasn't this a time?

'Proletarin Literature in the United States'

1935, the first serious collection, edited by Granville Hicks and featuring the work of Mike Gold, Isidor Schneider, Joseph North, and other noted writers of the day

Artists Union

American Artists Congress, 1936

depicted by Stuart Davis

The Benny Goodman Quartet, 1937

Goodman's combo was revolutionary in that it was fully integrated in a time of terrible racism--further the Quartet laid down the ground work for all chamber jazz to come. The blurring solos of Lionel Hampton's vibraphone brought that instrument into the forefront as a major voice in jazz; Gene Krupa's drumming in this period also created a major role for percussionists in all aspects of this genre. Not to forget Teddy Wilson's brilliant piano playing and the clarinet of the leader!

Partisan Review editors, 1938

Phillip Rahv and Dwight McDonald and co.

'Native Son'

Richard Wright's groundbreaking novel, 1940

Disney Cartoonists Strike!

1941--the very radical cartoonists' union takes the studio by storm

Josh White, Leadbelly and friends

1940, NYC, BBC radio airshot

Leadbelly

"Bougeois Blues"

Carl Sandburg

He covered the march of Coxey's Army, became an early Socialist Party cultural worker and was still a beloved, celebrated elder of American folk culture!

John Howard Lawson, HUAC Hearing

speaking back to power

Hollywood on trial

The Ten included Herbert Biberman, screenwriter and director Ring Lardner Jr., screenwriter John Howard Lawson, screenwriter Edward Dmytryk, director Adrian Scott, producer and screenwriter Samuel Ornitz, screenwriter Lester Cole, screenwriter Albert Maltz, screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, screenwriter Alvah Bessie, screenwriter Also the great Charlie Chaplin left the U.S to fink work because he was blacklisted. Only 10% of the artists succeeded in rebuilding their careers.

Dalton Trumbo

HUAC hearing

Arthur Miller

HUAC vs the playwright

Paul Robeson, 1949

immediately after the Peekskill Riot

Ralph Ellison

'Invisible Man'

The Weavers

Lillian Hellman

Wonderfully atmospheric shot of the brilliant playwright who stared down HUAC

'Masses and Mainstream'

1953

'High Noon', 1952

Gary Cooper stars in the film by blacklisted writer Carl Foreman, a perfect allegory for the isolative stand of those who opposed HUAC and McCarthy

'Howl' by Allen Ginsberg

The militantly revolutionary Gay poet's groundbreaking work, 1956

Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee

the couple modeled the concept of the artist/activist with their brilliant acting abilities and consistent place on the front lines of the struggles for civil rights and labor unions

Beat Poets

In this 1959 photograph taken in New York City, composer/musician David Amram (top right) is seen with some of the artists, poets and writers who would become the leaders of "The Beat Generation." They include (clockwise from Amram): poet Allen Ginsburg, writer Gregory Corso (back to camera), artist Larry Rivers and author Jack Kerouac. Photo: John Cohen, Courtesy of david amram

En Route to Chicago, '68

Jean Genet, William Burrough, Alan Ginsberg--noted poet-activists who were also loud and proud Gay liberationists

'What's Going On?'

Marvin Gaye

The Last Poets

1968: the interplay of free verse poetry, improvisation and the politicis of race and revolution

'Ohio', 1970

CSNY's song offered chilling, driving commentary on the shootings at Kent State University

War Is Over!(if you want it)

A Christmas message from John and Yoko, Times Square, NYC, 1970

Bob Marley

"Get Up, Stand Up"

Samuel Friedman

The Socialist Party's cultural leader seen here in a 1977 pic with his wife. Friedman was a journalist and activist who, after the dissolution of the SP's arts efforts, became one of the Party's candidates for often on multiple occasion (photo by Steve Rossignol).

Peter Tosh

'Talking Revolution'

Rock Against Racism

here's the album collection which chronicled the 1976 and '78 British concerts established to fight the rising trend of neo-fascist skinhead gangs in the UK

Robert Mapplethorpe

This gifted, militantly Gay photogrpaher set off a firestorm of controversy in opposition to the neo-cons of the Reagan administration and the Edwin Meese "decency" doctrine.

Patti Smith

brazenly outspoken punk poet and activist, late 1970s

'Reds' 1982

Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton as John Reed and Louise Bryant, en route to Petrograd

ROCK AGAINST REAGAN

The Dead Kennedys headed up the bill for this protest concert, Washington DC, 1983

Nuyorican Poets Cafe

'Bedtime for Democracy'

Public Enemy

Karen Finley

The sexually provacative feminist performance artist did constant battle with the neo-cons of the 1980s and '90s and became a poster child for right-wing calls to suspend funding to the NEA

'Mumia 911'

This series of arts-actions occured in multiple spaces throughout NYC and other cities in an attempt to raise both funds and awareness for the cause of Mumia Abu-Jamal, journalist and Black Panther who was framed on a police murder charge in the lates '70s and continues to sit in death row now. For this event, NY's Brecht Forum hosted an all-day marathon on September 11, 1999, the house band of which was led by John Pietaro.

Pete Seeger, Music in the History of Struggle, 1999

with the Ray Korona Band, John Pietaro on percussion. 1199SEIU auditorium, NYC

Ani DiFranco

Fred Ho

The revolutionary saxophonist/composer has successfully forged an avant garde music which bridges improvisation and New Music composition w/ Marxism, Maoism and traditional Chinese folk art.

'Not in Our Name'

Charlie Haden reunites his revolutionary ensemble one more time to speak out against the Bush administration's manipulations of the populace, 2005.

The Brecht Forum

The Brecht Forum/NYC Marxist School came to be a fixture of Left education and culture in the early 1970s lasting through 2014.

New Masses Nights

Joe Hill

The Industrial Workers Band

Arturo Giovannitti, around 1912

brilliant IWW poet/organizer who composed epic pieces about his imprisonment and the struggle for a more equitable society

Ralph Chaplin

IWW songwriter and journalist who penned "Solidarity Forever" in 1911

John Reed at his desk

note the Provincetown Playhouse poster!

Robert Minor, 'The Masses'

July 1916

Louise Bryant

Crusading journalist seen here approx 1918

Max Eastman

writer, activist, editor of 'The Masses'

Isadora Duncan

Modern Dance in revolution

Robert Minor

The radical artist and leading CPUSA functionary

Michael Gold

Cultural conscience of 'the Daily Worker', 'New Masses' and acclaimed proletarian novelist seen here addresseing a May Day crowd on the streets of Manhattan, early 1930s.

"Costume Ball--Where All Toilers Meet!"

The Daily Worker, January 14, 1928

VJ Jerome

Communist Party cultural commissar

NYC, 1931: A delegation of the John Reed Club following a trip to Harlan County, VA

John Dos Passos, Theodore Dreiser, Sam Ornitz

'The Crisis'

1933, radical magazine of Black American militancy

Marc Blitzstein

member of the Composers Collective of New York

'Negro Songs of Protest'

Compiled by Lawrence Gellert, illustrations by his brother the great Communist artist Hugo Gellert. The songs were arranged by Ellie Siegmeister of the Composers Collective of NY

'The Workers Song book, Workers Music League, 1934

compiled by the Composers Collective of New York

American Artists' Congress

Signed by AAC Secretary STUART DAVIS

Diego Rivera

Diego Rivera

"Class Struggle"

Diego Rivera's amazing work told the story of the workers' fight against capitalist exploitation --and was created as a commision for Rockefeller Center's main hall. It was not long before John D had the piece destroyed.

'Processional', 1937

modernist drama by John Howard Lawson, a leader of CPUSA cultural activists

The Almanac Singers, 1941

THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS

Woody

Silent speak-back to HUAC

George Orwell

the British writer maintained his democratic socialist views through his great novels

Earl Robinson, ca 1940s

member of the Composers Collective of New York, leader of the American People's Chorus and a musician of the people throughout his career. Among his compositions was "Joe Hill", "The House I Live in", "Ballad for Americans" and "Black and White"

Hanns Eisler, HUAC hearing, 1947

Trumbo and Lawson

Paul Robeson at Peekskill

Flanked by unionist and Communist guards, staring down the fascist mobs at Peekskill NY, 1949

Sinclair Lewis

'It Can't Happen Here'

Dashiell Hammet

closing out the HUAC onslaught

'Salt of the Earth'

Paul Robeson shouts down HUAC

"You are the Un-Americans--and you should be ashamed of yourselves!"

W.E.B. DuBois

Stockholm Peace Conference, 1955

'Rebel Poets of America', 1957 LP

Kenneth Patchen and Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Amiri Baraka

"We Insist!--Freedom Now Suite"

Max Roach with Abbey Lincoln

Lorraine Hansberry

Peter, Paul and Mary

1963 March on Washington

'Spartacus', 1964

The tale of a unified slave revolt was first written by Howard Fast in novel form and then realized for the screen by Dalton Trumbo

Bill Dixon's OCTOBER REVOLUTION IN JAZZ, 1964

John Coltrane

Seen here performing his powerful piece, "Alabama" on German television, 1965. The story of the church bombing which killed four African American girls and injured others was retold in this mournful work.

The Fugs

Radical Greenwich Village poets turn rock-n-rollers of a whole other sort, 1965

Freedom Marching

James Baldwin, Joan Baez, and James Forman (left to right) enter Montgomery, Alabama on the Selma to Montgomery march for voting rights, 1965.

You Can't Jail the Revolution

Shades of Chicago, '68

Sam Rivers

The great jazz musician who helped to found the avant garde loft scene in the 1960s was devoutly outspoken with regard to radical politics and the incorporation of same into his music. He is seen here performing at his own NYC space, Studio Rivbea. From the look of that tom-tom to the left, the drummer is Milford Graves who not only broke new ground into improvisational music but its part in Black liberation and other revolutionary struggles.

Henry Cow, late '60s

British avant rock band also engaged in social statements and celebrated the music of Brecht & Eisler

Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra

1969: Bassist extraordinaire Haden (right) unites with pianist-arranger Carla Bley (left), trumpeter Don Cherry (kneeling) and a wealth of others to create a radical album of anti-war music. Included in the collection was a powerful reconfiguring of Brecht and Eisler's Song of the United Front

Gil Scott Heron

"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised"

MC 5

Kicking out the jam as well as the walls of conformity

Rally for John Sinclair

this fund- and awareness-raising event was in honor of the noted anti-war activist who'd been arrested on trumped-up drug charges. It featured John and Yoko, Alan Ginsberg, Phil Ochs, Archie Shepp, Commander Cody and a host of others

Art Ensemble of Chicago

Revolutionary composition/improvisation: "a great Black music"

Victor Jara

The great Chilean revolutionary songwriter

TILLIE OLSEN w/MAYA ANGELOU

Writers March Against Apartheid, 1970s

Frederic Rzewski

In 1975 the composer created "THE PEOPLE UNITED WILL NEVER BE DEFEATED", inspired by the struggles of farm workers and militants around the globe

Richard Hell

Nihilistic poet of punk performing with the Voidoids at CBGB

ABC No Rio

activist performance space, NY's Lower East Side

'London Calling'

The Clash

Fela Kuti

Revolution in song from Nigeria

'Bonzo Goes to Bitburg', 1985

The Ramones satiric commentary on Reagan's visit to the Nazi soldiers cemetary

'Witnesses: Against Our Vanishing'

Artist Space, NYC, 1989: reactionaries tried at all costs to shut down this boldly outspoken exhibit on AIDS

Day Without Art

Visual AIDS and other arts activist organizations created a Day Without Art to commemorate World AIDS Day

Tupac Shakur

Militant Hip Hop 101

'Somebody Blew Up America'

Amiri Baraka, fearlessly taking on the controversial causes of the 9/11 attacks

Robeson

After falling victim to a nation which tried to disappear him, Paul Robeson is honored with his own stamp

The first Dissident Fest: The Dissident Folk Festival 2006

This event featured Malachy McCourt, Pete Seeger, Bev Grant, Lack and a bevy of radical jazz musicians, poets and more